272 ACCOUNT OF THE STRUCTURE 



covered with gardens, laid out in the Dutch style. In 

 this space, of course, the rock is nowhere to be seen. Exactly 

 in the middle of the perpendicular face of the Table Moun- 

 tain, a ravine indents it to a considerable depth. Down this 

 a stream constantly runs, which is often suddenly swelled into 

 an impetuous torrent, and has acted very powerfully in clear- 

 ing away the earth and rubbish, and in laying bare the rock to 

 a considerable extent. The ascent to the top is by this ravine, 

 and, though the distance is not great, is a work of consider- 

 able labour, on account of the steepness, and still more, on ac- 

 count of the vast fragments of rock, which one must clamber over 

 continually, and which seem so exactly poised, that the least 

 addition to the weight of the projecting side, must precipitate 

 them to the bottom. The cut thus made in the mountain is 

 about twenty or thirty yards deep, and from ten to fifteen 

 wide at the bottom, though, at the upper part, the walls are not 

 distant from one another by more than eight or ten feet. 



Captain Hall, in a letter to his father Sir James, gives the 

 following account of his first ascent. 



" The day before yesterday, I set out on an excursion to the 

 Table Mountain, with the ardour and impatience that you, I 

 have no doubt, on similar occasions, have often experienced. 

 I set out with the intention of following the course of a stream 

 that descends from the ravine in the face of the mountain. For 

 a considerable distance at the bottom of the mountain, the soil 

 covers the rock ; and a little higher up, I found large fragments 

 of sandstone, and now and then a block of granite, which had 

 come down from above. I came, after a short ascent, to a 

 space where many yards of the rock were laid perfectly bare, 

 and I found myself walking on vertical Schistus, or on what 

 might be called Killas. This rock was in beds highly inclined, 



and 



